Fog Heart

by Thomas Tessier

Two couples, both skeptical and desperate, are drawn together by a medium named Oona, a fragile, beautiful young woman who knows things that no other living person should know. Is her gift real, or is it the sign of a consuming madness? Can she lead them all to important truths, or will they be trapped in the tightening web of terror and death?

Fog Heart was named one of the best books of the year by Publishers Weekly, and awarded the International Horror Guild's honors for Best Novel.

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Fantasy, Mystery, Novels, Gothic, Ghosts

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Thomas Tessier grew up in Connecticut and attended University College, Dublin. He is the author of several acclaimed novels of terror and suspense, plays, poems, and short stories. His novel Fog Heart received the International Horror Guild's Award for Best Novel, was a Bram Stoker Award finalist, and was cited by Publishers Weekly as one of the Best Books of the Year. He lives in Connecticut.

Reviews

[Jeffrey Keeten · Rating 5 out of 5]

”Fog land have I seen
Fog heart have I eaten”
---Ingeborg Bachmann

We all carry ghosts around with us. People who have died. People we have wronged. People who have wronged us. People we have lost contact with. Though we may never see any of them again, we still having lingering bits of unfinished business with them: a last word, a clarification of a point, an apology, or maybe just one last hug.

They are ghosts.

For most of us the dead do not manifest themselves except in dreams or in memories. It had been the same for Carrie, too, until her father suddenly materialized across the table from her. His lips are moving, and he is trying to say something. She’s distracted by the fact that he is absolutely starkers, as naked as the day he was born. A tux might have been too much to ask for, but how about a fig leaf, Dad?

Charley, a knockabout English professor, who has taught at some of the best schools in Europe and the United States, is contemplating the possibility that it is time to get a more permanent position, but he knows it will more likely be in some place like Nebraska or Louisiana. Can he drink enough scotch to live in Nebraska? At least he wouldn’t have to pick up and move his extensive book collection anymore. ”The hardest part of this tinker’s life was packing and transporting books. But they were indispensable. They couldn't be locked away in storage somewhere. The secret of mental balance for Charley was to be found in a houseful of good books---and a decent drink now and a then.”

Books allow us to live anywhere and have a rich life.

Whenever I have moved, which has been a long time since the last time, I’ve always unpacked my books first. Fortunately for me, my wife has always dutifully unpacked those other necessities that allow us to feed ourselves and look presentable for work. The spines of the books are suppose to be peering out at me from their places on the shelves and reassure me that I have a plethora of rabbit holes to disappear down if my life requires escape. In boxes, they are merely inanimate objects waiting...waiting in that space to be found again. A knight does not bury his swords in the ground to rust. Books are a reader’s weapon, kept sharp with use.

A friend, who had seen a celebrated medium, a psychic if you will, shares with Charley that he feels he needs to see her. She mentioned something, a name, that sent a chill down Charley’s back.

FIONA

His dead daughter.



”A message from the dead cannot be real
Must not be answered.”

As much as he tries, he cannot ignore it, and what of his wife Jan? She has been a walking zombie ever since Fiona died. Should he keep this from her, or should he give her some hope of communicating with their lost child?

Oliver is away in Europe, shagging a young woman enamored with his charms, while his wife is having her unnerving experience with the ghost of her father. He is mildly alarmed that the only thing she could make out that her father was trying to tell her was...Oliver. He is an importer/exporter of jeans and art. This allows him to take a week here or there to be in Europe, looking for new business opportunities, a new dalliance, or adding a new stamp to his collection. ”To Oliver stamps were a dazzling universe of miniature art, intricate, layered in arcane history, utterly pure and beautiful.”

I used to collect stamps when I was a kid, but I soon decided that one obsession at a time was all I could do well. Books were much more important to me than stamps, but stamps were a beautiful, temporary addiction.

The two couples are baffled, skeptical, and spooked, but both come to the same conclusion that if this young girl can help, then what can it hurt to see her? ”Oona had something of the deranged poet about her, slowly eviscerating herself to find an impossible truth.”

Oona is pretty, appealing, delicate, and so fragile to be contending with the powerful forces that attempt to rip her apart whenever she opens herself up to those attention starved souls. The scenes where she is communicating the jumbled messages are creepy, painful, and at one point brought tears to my eyes.

It is all somewhat imprecise. ”In the right circumstances she can open new lines of understanding and that can make a profound difference to the people involved. It’s often a difficult process that takes time, but it can also be as brief and inexact as looking through the window of a train as it speeds by. And that may be all you ever get.”

Is she a charlatan or a sensitive, deluded girl who can make much of very little?

Everyone has secrets, but there are different kinds of secrets. There are embarrassing ones, there are little lies, there are some secrets that are not yours to share, and there are some secrets that you wish someone would ask you about so you can unburden yourself. There are also dark, dirty secrets that if known can be detrimental, not only to yourself, but to those you love. What kind of secrets do you harbor in your heart?



Someone in the group has a pitch-black heart filled with foul and wicked deeds. As Oona unravels what the spirit world is telling her, she is unmooring the life of a psychopath.

”A ghost is a form of redemption.”

I’ve never really given Thomas Tessier’s books more than a casual glance from time to time. When Centipede Press sent me an offer to buy a beautiful, signed edition of Fog Heart at a ridiculously reduced rate, I bought it because I loved the cover, and I’d heard that Fog Heart was his best book.

I’m so glad I did.

Horror has rarely been written with such lyricism or a story so creepy; and yet, so beautifully told. The writing drew me in immediately. I read a hundred pages in my first sitting. I’ve always been an agnostic in regards to the existence of ghosts, but ghosts aren’t always what we think they are. Tessier had me believing in ghosts in a way I’ve never thought about them before. I was very quickly psychologically invested in the characters and the plot. I was deftly dodging other responsibilities and hours of sleep so I could spend more time reading this book. The twist and turns left me gasping and filled me with trepidation.

I’ll just end with my summation…WOW!

Highly recommended!

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[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tessier knows how to build up the 'creep factor' and Fog Heart excels in this regard. The tale centers on Oona, a young lady around 21 or so at the start of the novel. A brief prologue has Oona contemplating suicide while swimming off the coast of New Haven, only to be saved by Roz, her sister. Tessier then introduces the rest of the cast and the story shifts narration among all the main characters. First, we have Oliver and Carrie in NYC. We quickly learn Oliver leads two lives-- the happy husband who takes pride in starting new business ventures and a man who likes to kill others. Carrie, a home decorator, sees a ghost or something of her father one day in her NYC flat; he seems to be worried about her, but her father died several years ago.

Our second couple, Jen and Charley, live in New Haven as Charley currently has a teaching gig at Yale; Charley, the wandering academic, moves almost every year for a new job. Charley's best buddy, and the one who got him the job at Yale, tells him one day that at a 'seance' locally, he heard the medium (Oona) say a few things that disturbed him. It seems Oona mentioned Fiona and Ravenswood and Charley's bud knew the story there. Several years ago when Charley was teaching in Galway, he and Jan had Fiona, a little girl, but she died aged just a few months. How on Earth did Oona know about that? Turns out Jan has been having dreams of Fiona as well. Long story short, eventually both couples see Oona and Roz...

Tessier outdid himself with the cast here, all deftly developed and many not likeable at all. Oliver? He goes on business trips to Europe and occasionally kills people. Charley? He tolerates his wife Jan but sleeps with graduate students all the time when he is not boozing it up (and sometimes then too). Jan resides in the background of the story; quiet, mousey and haunted. Carrie comes off as the most likeable; she keeps seeing more visions or something and they terrify her. Oona exists as a mystery. She 'connects' with people but really has no control over the process. She goes into horrific trances and speaks with several voices, sometimes all at once. Tessier had me biting my nails!

I had this on my shelf for years and am glad I finally got to it. Tessier may not be the most prolific author out there, but I have enjoyed all of his novels so far. 4.5 creepy stars!

[Graham P · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first I expected a novel about the dead coming back to wreak havoc on those who've betrayed and harmed them in life, but deeper into it, I realized it was more about how the ghosts are fueled by the inner guilt of the living, taking shape to either warn, or remind, them of what's waiting around the corner. Focusing on two couples who are brought together by a young waif-ish yet beautiful medium, Oona, the novel is told in their perspective - quite personal and not meandering into atmosphere, dramatic plot contrivances, but staying within nuance and suggestion - reality. These characters are not really likable, but they have dimension, truths, and Tessier lets all their dark secrets unfold with a masterly and patient aim. While it is an 'understated' horror novel (no paramount dualities of good versus evil here), Tessier goes quite brutal in scenes, and the last quarter of the book reads like a gruesome tragedy of fate. Elegant at times, visceral when it needs to be, Fog Heart is a unique, stand-out novel of horror.

(note: I imagined German/Irish actor, Michael Fassbender, playing the role of the Brit, Oliver - and at the end of the novel, thought that Fassbender's collaborator, director Steve McQueen, would be a perfect choice to visualize this novel).

[Kevin Lucia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent. Spooky, moody, melancholy. Ending sort of dragged a little, but on a whole very enjoyable.

[Karl]

This is copy 40 of 220 signed and numbered copies, Signed by:

Thomas Tessier
Mark Granier (Introduction)
Samuel Araya (Cover Artist)

[Matthew Bielawa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed Tessier's literary writing style. I was engaged in the story and deeply connected to the characters right from the beginning. The story slowly and carefully evolves as you get to know each of thee characters-their own background and stories. Sure, I knew where the book was heading, but Tessier's writing style was so absorbing that I just enjoyed sitting back and letting the author tell his story.
Other reviewers go into the details of the book so I won't here. But I loved the idea of getting to know the two couples and their interaction with the medium. And the medium, Oona...what a character. Just who is she? What's going on with her? And how are these couples connected? It's a mystery within a mystery within a mystery.
There are plenty of spooky moments that jump out of nowhere in Tessier's smooth style. Tension grows and grows almost until you (and the characters) can't take it anymore. A great read! My favorite part of the book by far was the beginning and middle. For the first two thirds of the story I was thinking this is one of my favorite books, mainly due to Tessier's style. But by the very end it got a bit repetitive and the conclusion got a bit, in my personal opinion, spoiled by some unlikely events with all the traveling. But probably I'm most judgmental about the ending because I loved the rest of the book so much. I look forward to reading more from Thomas Tessier!

[Paul Bartusiak · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't know if I've ever rated a book one star.

Usually, if they're this bad, I don't even finish. My wife read it all the way through; she's so thoughtful, it was my gift to her after it made my list on Goodreads. So, I felt I should read it too, especially when she just looked at me and said, "Why would you get me this?"

This book was awful, a waste of time, sick, decrepit. No art involved, no lyrical passages to give it meaning, make me look beyond the depravity, the shallowness, the utter disregard for the sanctity of marriage, of family...

And oh, it wasn't scary, wasn't creepy, or eerie, just sickening (S&M, torture for sexual pleasure).
If it was supposed to be a mysterious ending, it wasn't...it landed with a thud.

Be warned...or for some, don't be fooled.

I don't like to give negative reviews...would rather burn it in the fireplace (which I may still do) and let it go quietly. But it would be a disservice to society.

Bad. Don't be curious and read it because of what I just said...it's B...A...D!

[Marina Schnierer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a hard one for me to review. I loved this book, it was an original story for me and quite thought provoking but at the same time strange in that I couldn't relate to the characters and I didn't quite gel with the ending. Even with that I still felt it deserved 5 stars purely because I haven't read anything quite like it and did enjoy it for that reason.

[Bill Hsu · Rating 2 out of 5]

This reads to me like it was written much earlier than '97, with the extended musings of the characters, and documentation of their alcohol and tobacco consumption. I'm reminded a little of when I saw Dr. No. a couple years ago.

More notes:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Christian V · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thriller of unusual depth. The plot in brief: Two couples who don't know each other end up enlisting the help of the same “clairvoyant”, a young girl of 20 who is struggling to shoulder the burden of her dark gift. In the course of the book we travel from the mind of one character to another, and discover what the clairvoyant's revelations say about each of them.

Tessier's prose is tight, pacey, and vibrant, he does not shy away from the darker aspects of sex, and for that matter the darker side of human nature, men in particular. There is a seediness in his portrayal of both male protagonists, and a very powerful, intimate, and keenly emotional depiction of the female psyche. The scene in the first chapter, indeed in the first two pages, lures you in whether you like it or not. I dare anyone not to be hooked from the outset. What follows is a gradual crescendo of revelations and character unfoldings, with a powerful conclusion.

I was introduced to Thomas Tessier years ago on the strength of one of his short stories entitled “Lulu”, and discovered a writer with a dark, elegant, European sensibility who in that particular story was able to pull off a piece of intriguing historical fiction around the figure of Joseph Roth. That's another reason I will never tire of saying that short story collections are a goldmine: they never fail to provide me with at least one or two authors out of, say, twenty, whose works I will go on to devour in short order.

I read this book on my recent holiday in Sardinia, and I am always surprised at how the book I'm reading enters into a vivid exchange with the surroundings I'm reading it in. My girlfriend and I would visit a different beach each day, and both the beach and the given chapter I was reading fueled each other in the strangest way, and will now be inextricably linked in my memory.

[Jacob Elliott · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

I’ll be honest and say the synopsis of this one did not grab me. The cover of the version I have did not grab me. And the first few chapters didn’t grab me much either.

But as things kept going…ooh boy did they pick up. I loved the middle part of this book! I found it riveting as we switched between the two impacted couples with small interludes of our psychic/medium of sorts Oona thrown in throughout. I wasn’t 100% what was happening, or where things were going to go, but I liked it. The vibes were creepy and autumnal and great for this time of year as fall is finally starting to set in.

The one thing I needed was a bit more closure toward the end. Things build to this incredible place by the end, but the falling action left me sort of confused and wanting a bit more. I don’t mind a mysterious ending with a lot of lingering threads left untethered (my own writing tends to fall into this camp more often than not) but I felt like I wanted a bit more interaction between certain characters at the end to really tie the whole thing together. It felt like after a certain point some of the characters were left out of the ending when I felt like really we still needed them there.

[Misty · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

[Edoardo Nesto · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is a psychological thriller; I was quite disturbed for a few days after I finished it

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though not particularly scary in a Stephen King sort of way, Fog Heart is an intriguingly different sort of mystery. Populated by a cast of psychologically crippled, twisted couples who are initially unknown to one another, the plot revolves around their coming together via their work with an exceedingly strange young medium, Oona.

[Jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

A gripping story overall, but I found myself at an emotional distance most of the time. Even the creepy bits, I felt like I was observing them from high above, and so I was more intrigued than scared. Then men were too godawful for me to care much about them, and the women felt very far away and mysterious.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

First off I absolutely loved this. My 3rd Tessier novel of the year and it was great. Awesome characters with great descriptive backstories to each. The story follows two separate couples, facing their own life struggles, who are drawn to Oona. A young beautiful medium who is also living with her own hidden past. I love the fact that you’re never sure if her “gift” is real or if she’s just mad. You could say it follows 3 couples. As Oona and her sister Roz are also a main storyline in themselves. The ONLY part I can say is the ending was a bit of a letdown for me, but then again I haven’t loved any of Tessier’s endings so far. 5 stars for the book and 2 for the ending! He’s such an awesome author!

[Light C · Rating 1 out of 5]

The one star is solely for Oona.

This is possibly one of the most nonsensical books I've read. It uses so many words from so many POVs just so say nothing really.

Both of the male leads are lecherous cheats who oogle every woman in the book. One of them makes sense but not the other aside from building a paper thin connection between the two couples.
It felt like every interesting plot point was derailed for several pages instead on the subject of cheating or how hot women are.

Even Carrie and Roz aren't spared from finding Oona attractive and both have scenes charged with romance that feels out of nowhere especially for Carrie.

[Bill Borre]

I am sorry to leave a comment here under reviews for a book that I have not read yet but I wanted to assign a date for this book and the date set functionality of the website currently seems to be broken. If they get this working I will use this and delete this review.

05-03-2016

[Elaine H · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wierd sad horrifying story. 2 stars, not because I liked it, but for some originality.

[Margie Clark · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was an interesting read but disappointed in the ending. I thought there would be more and felt like I was left hanging a bit and a little confused.

[Roger O · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tessier brings his signature psychosexual flair to a moody, well-crafted gothic that feels like a love letter to hauntings and obsession.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well. Goes into a completely different direction than expected.

[Lea · Rating 1 out of 5]

So dull (dated?) I literally took it back to the book store.

[Josephine · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a strangely disturbing book! But then Tessier's books are like that; I'm still not sure if Oona was a genuine psychic or a disturbed young woman.